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Snow's on the ground. It's the time of year when the familiar voices of Newsreaders on BBC, Sky, etc. etc. all seem to unite in asking viewers to "Send us your weather snaps", and we'll use the best ones......for free of course!....(check their website "conditions of submission")
Prepare yourselves for nightly "viewers pictures" of their snow covered gardens...(with grey snow)....pics of the family pet with a Santa hat....pics.of little Kevin with his snowman......
Confirmation that TV companies will use any old rubbish these days....so long as it's free.
It's one of the downsides of the easy transmission of digital...Previously, for still pictures of news situations, they would have to commission a professional to go out and get pictures.
Is there any other profession where people would provide a service to a commercial company for free, and furthermore allow the possibility of their pictures being syndicated.....again for no recompense?
But..hold on...if they've got time, they might read out a credit....picture by so & so......now doesn't that make you feel a whole lot better??!
Quote: Is there any other profession where people would provide a service to a commercial company for free, and furthermore allow the possibility of their pictures being syndicated.....again for no recompense?
Well, you've just added content to Epz for no recompense 
Many commercial websites exist where all the content is provided by people for nothing. Look at youtube, millions of hours of content provided for nothing. In software development, open-source makes sophisticated code available to commercial companies for nothing.
It seems that in the modern world the old ways of making money from intellectual property no longer seem to apply.
Quote:
It seems that in the modern world the old ways of making money from intellectual property no longer seem to apply.
Taken to its ultimate conclusion, if everyone can grab intellectual property for free, this would spell the end of the professional photographer.
Quote: Taken to its ultimate conclusion, if everyone can grab intellectual property for free, this would spell the end of the professional photographer.
Welcome to the world of 'Post-Production'!!
Quote: if everyone can grab intellectual property for free, this would spell the end of the professional photographer.
I can't see it going any other way I'm afraid, very few people will be able to make a living as simply a pro photographer they will have to double as writers, web designers,etc just to stay in work.
We have already seen a similar thing happen in the music business, bands no longer make much money from record sales - that's why they have all started touring to try and earn some cash.
Quote:
Welcome to the world of 'Post-Production'!!
Think I preferred the mobile phone free "old world" of Rolleiflex and a roll of Tri-X!
Quote:
We have already seen a similar thing happen in the music business, bands no longer make much money from record sales - that's why they have all started touring to try and earn some cash.
Yes we have, and it is perhaps significant that standards in the music business have nose-dived accordingly. You could argue that the deliberate "dumbing down" of photography in the media generally, ("we have to give the peasants stuff they can understand").....not my words, but the overheard words of a news executive......has led to the best photographers getting out of the business or being made redundant. (this is a fact) and in their place we have the paparazzi.
Having once worked in the business myself, I find it somewhat ironical that millions have been spent on new technology develpment, only to make matters worse!......Managements have forgotten one important fact: Great newspapers and magazines are brought about by great writers and photographers, not by AppleMacs.
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Taken to its ultimate conclusion, if everyone can grab intellectual property for free, this would spell the end of the professional photographer.
You've got to come up with added value to make money nowadays.
Quote: Great newspapers and magazines are brought about by great writers and photographers
But who would buy them, when the internet provides all you can read for free?
We are in a time of massive technological change, with the digitization of media all the old certainties and ways of working will be affected.
I am reminded of the old pro I spent a while chatting to on a summers evening on Coniston water, he reconed everything was fine till colour film came out..that ruined the business.
I expect portrait painters moaned about these new fangled cameras taking their business many years ago.
The only constant is change.
Quote: The only constant is change.
I'm not averse to "change"...so long as it means the quality is improved or at least maintained. Unfortunately new technology within the media, rather than being used to improve quality, has led to a belief that computers can replace people, hence bouts of "cost-cutting"...i.e. redundancies, are now regular events on all newspapers and magazines....When greed and profit becomes the main motivator, then integrity goes flying out the window.
I also agree with your "old pro" colleague...News pictures were best depicted in black & white, it has a direct "graphic" quality that colour cannot match. Colour is often an unwanted distraction that removes all the drama from a picture......Newsprint and black & white were made for each other. Colour needs the glossy high quality of a magazine to show it at its best.
Imagine Cartier Bresson's pictures in colour...they just wouldn't work, anymore than would the grittiness of Don McCullin's war pictures.
Latest is not always best.
I'm not a professional, and thank god I dont have to make a living from it..........................because I'm no david bailey and no-one is going to pay for my images...............not for many years anyway, not until I get a lot better.
Quote: But..hold on...if they've got time, they might read out a credit....picture by so & so......now doesn't that make you feel a whole lot better??!
Yep.........that will do me in the mean time.
I work in Engineering as a skilled CNC machinist with 40 years experience, and in the last few years my boss has been letting other skilled people leave and employing unskilled labour to replace them.
Then he expects the few remaining skilled guys to teach them how to operate the the machines and watch what they do.
Then he blames us when they meddle with the settings and **** up.
So it is not just the media companies that are cheepskate, it runs through the whole working culture!
Dave
Why does everything have to be for money?? I'm sure that 99.9% of the people that send in their pics are not pro's or even amatuer's. They are everyday people that take 'snaps' of the weather in their area and send them in - and i bet they get a huge kick out of seeing their pic on screen too.
Some of the images I have seen these last few days have been very good - so what if the white balance is out a bit, or the horizon is a bit off!! Let them get on with it, and leave the professional photography to you!!!
Quote: Snow's falling. TV want weather pics....for free!
Good for them
Quote: I work in Engineering as a skilled CNC machinist with 40 years experience, and in the last few years my boss has been letting other skilled people leave and employing unskilled labour to replace them.
Then he expects the few remaining skilled guys to teach them how to operate the the machines and watch what they do.
Then he blames us when they meddle with the settings and **** up.
So it is not just the media companies that are cheepskate, it runs through the whole working culture!
Yep know exactly what you mean. Its the same in the printing industry
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